Class of 2013 Fellows Cohort 22:

Sakina Abdus-Shakur, '13 is from Philadelphia, PA and is a
Philosophy major and a Creative Writing minor. Her mentor is Professor Robert
Dostal. She is interested in exploring the ideologies of self-esteem through the
lense of education. Self-esteem is a psychological appraisal of self worth,
which is comprised of a correlating beliefs and emotions. In the consideration
of belief from the lense of education, she will consider statements such as “I
am intelligent”, “I am worthy” and their converses, “I am stupid” and “I am
unworthy”. Through philosophical and psychological readings, anthropological
ethnography and sociological studies, she intends to explore the implications of
positive of negative foundational beliefs of self. The second component of
self-esteem is emotions. Emotions that may be felt in relation to education are
pride, shame, triumph or despair. How do these positive or negative emotions
interact with belief, and affect academic ability? How do people's beliefs and
emotions create ideologies of academic affirmation or of academic inadequacies?
Can education affect personal ideologies? What roles do beliefs and emotions
play in the development of intellect? In order to develop her research on this
subject matter, Sakina plans to attend the Mellon Mays Undergraduate Research
Training Program at the University of Chicago this summer.

Rachel Kutten, '13 is from Montgomery Village, Maryland
and is majoring in sociology with an English minor. Her mentor, Profesor Robert
Washington, will assist her in exploring “cyber racism” and how it is manifested
on the internet. She will examine how cyber racism can be found on some internet
communities, and the implications it has for the way Americans in particular
talk about race offline. Rachel will argue that cyber racism within internet
communities that are catered towards Americans can expose and help acknowledge
the inadequate discourse about race offline in the United States, which includes
using the terms “post-racial” or “colorblind.” Internet communities can provide
social support and venues of expression for people who are frustrated about
inadequate race talk offline. In addition, the internet as a structure that can
resemble life offline allows the mindset of colorblindness and post-racialism to
permeate it. Rachel will do a content analysis of internet comments on news
stories about the 2009 BART police shooting of Oscar Grant from three different
news blogs: dailykos.com, CNN.com, and freerepublic.com. With her methodology
she will decipher if these comments about the event come across as racist. By
“racist,” it means that these comments would have to include the covert form of
colorblind racism or post racialism, concepts that have been accepted offline by
some Americans and have proven to belittle the plight of people of color. In the
summer of 2011 Rachel attended a research training program at the University of
Chicago and created a proposal for her Mellon project. Those who have inquires
about Rachel’s research project can send her an email at
rkutten@brynmawr.edu.

Jomaira Salas, '13 is a sophomore from Lynn, Massachusetts
majoring in sociology with an education minor. Her interests lie on the
intersection of immigration and education in the United States and France. She
is primarily interested in how public perception of immigration and immigration
policy affect educational aspirations among first-generation immigrants. For her
Mellon research project she will compare how immigration has defined the
educational aspirations of students in Philadelphia and Paris. She is planning
on studying abroad in spring 2012 in Paris, France. Jomaira will be conducting
this project under the guidance of Professor David Karen in the Sociology
department.

Jacinda Tran,'13of Newark, Delaware is majoring in Growth
and Structure of Cities with minors in Environmental Studies and Chinese. Her
freshman year, Jacinda was assigned to Professor Gary McDonogh, who has now
become her major advisor and Mellon Mays mentor. In her research, she hopes to
investigate public spaces and their social implications in addition to the
issues of accessibility and disparities associated with them. This summer,
Jacinda will be undertaking Mandarin language study in Shanghai, China for eight
weeks through the Critical Language Scholarship. While there, she hopes to make
observations that will direct her research towards a more specific focus. In
the spring, Jacinda aspires to carry on her research in Buenos Aires, Argentina
or Quito, Ecuador where she will tentatively be studying abroad.